Portsmouth Citizens Crusade Against Porn

Anti-pornography crusaders in Portsmouth say they're calling the police chief's bluff and pressing for the city to prosecute businesses that rent or sell X-rated video tapes.

Two such tapes were presented to the Portsmouth City Council at its Tuesday night meeting, during which one of the women handing over the tapes described, in detail, what she had seen on the videotape, said city spokeswoman Carol Pratt.

The presentation was the latest action in an effort led by Tom Wilkins to ban X-rated books and movies from Portsmouth, a city Wilkins called "the cesspool of Southeast Virginia."

Portsmouth, Isle of Wight County and Suffolk are the three remaining Southside communities in which such material can be bought or rented, Wilkins said. Wilkins has called for a unified attack on moral grounds against Portsmouth to "bring that city in line with the other communities," namely Norfolk, Chesapeake and Virginia Beach.

"Either those cities are doing something terribly wrong, and we're doing something so right, or we have to change," Wilkins said.

Wilkins, at one point during his battle, threatened to buy billboard space throughout Hampton Roads to tout Portsmouth's status as "a haven for pornography," he said. But that effort fizzled when the costs for renting the space rose.

Until the council meeting, attended by about 200 supporters of Wilkins' efforts, "no citizen has presented us with a complaint," said Portsmouth Police Chief Joseph Kozill.

The tapes were in the custody of the police Vice-Narcotics Special Investigation Unit to be forwarded to the Com monwealth's attorney, who will ultimately decide what action, if any, shall be taken, Kozill said.

"We wanted to call the chief's bluff on this," Wilkins said. The presentation of the tapes, along with the entire effort, was spurred by numerous complaints from parents about the accessibility of X-rated tapes.

"I run a video repair service," Wilkins said. "We get about 30 to 40 machines a week with tapes stuck in them, and about half of those are X-rated tapes. Given those numbers, there's bound to be some kids watching them," he added.

Wilkins is a Chesapeake resident whose business is in Portsmouth. "We're just citizens who agree on the same basic issue," he said, referring to his group. "We're just trying to make it a little difficult for kids to get these tapes."

A 1973 U.S. Supreme Court ruling leaves it up to communities to set their own standards of what is obscene. A jury must decide that a magazine or film is "patently offensive" to the community's standards and that as a whole it lacks "serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value."

One of the tapes at issue contains three men and a woman performing various sex acts simultaneously, Wilkins said. "Three guys and a broad, no way, no matter how perverted you are, can escape that definition," he said.

Wilkins went on to complain that Portsmouth city officials have ignored his efforts, even after hearing his argument. "It's a case where we felt we've been lied to for so long."